In November 1966, voters in twenty-two counties elected seventeen district court judges as the first implementation of the State's revamped lower court system. The twenty-two counties were located in districts 1, 12, 14, 16, 25, and 30. A second phase of enactment came in December 1968 when twenty more districts elected a dozen judges and the final phase in 1970 when elections decided judges for the districts not incorporated into the new system.